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A bit overwhelmingly curious

Hi all I am a bit overwhelmed by the pure plethora of things on this site. Please understand I am NOT complaining. It's great and perfect just as it is. I am just being a bit perfectly curious as to where I really should be focusing my efforts as a newbie to this site but also Zen in general. I have been going through all the talks for beginners, Buddha basics etc. I have been siting regularly almost daily and participating in the weekly Zazenkai. I guess it will just take me awhile, to get used to all this.

The second part of my question is simply this. What should be the approach when you are sitting in Shikantaza and great insights come up? I understand how we should come back to just sitting and come again to the clear blue sky ten thousand times. But what about when something really useful for our own development comes up? Also what advice would you give for someone new to meditation and a great deal of repressed emotion is coming up? I have had some experience teaching Chi Kung, as well as doing acupuncture therapy where opening up like that can be very traumatic to some people.

This is my fifth visit to Korea, but have just spent the last few days re-figuring out the subway system in Seoul, so I can relate! But once one gets the lay of the land, it starts to fall in place.

First and last, there is sitting on the Zafu ... Shikantaza!

Others may have some pointers to getting around here, but I believe the below information I sent you in our Welcome message should be a start ... (I boldface a few in particular) ...

Gassho, Jundo

---------------------

To get you oriented, please first watch this short Welcome Video (LINK) and Guided Tour of Treeleaf (LINK).

If you have never sat much Shikantaza Zazen before, here is an introductory Guide to Basic Sitting (PDF) (LINK)

FOR --ALL-- FOLKS NEW TO TREELEAF, whether LONG EXPERIENCED or NEW TO PRACTICE, Taigu and I have made a special series of TALKS FOR BEGINNERS (we're all always beginners!). Here is the first of those (there are 24 in the series, a few minutes each). I ask that you do look at those, even if you have been practicing forever or are new to practice, and hope they are helpful. Please have a look to get a taste of the style ofShikantaza Zazen emphasized here in our Sangha:

After that, if new to Buddhist Practice, we also have some short introductions to basic Buddhist Teachings (LINK)

This place is not meant as merely an "internet forum," and we are trying to nurture here everything that can be experienced in a Sangha community made of wood or bricks. We are an ordinary Zen Sangha. Please feel and be at home here.

Let me mention that our Practice here, and our Lineage, are centered on 'Just Sitting' Shikantaza and the teaching of Master Dogen. I mention that because, sometimes, we get folks here from other traditions and styles of meditation (e.g., Vipassana or Koan centered Zazen), and they want to practice "Karate" in our "Ai-ki-do" Dojo.People from all traditions and practices are welcome to sit here, but our teaching and this Sangha are focused only on Shikantaza, and that is what we are teaching through the Sangha.

I do ask folks who participate in our Sangha to be sitting in the style of 'Just Sitting' Shikantaza at least once per day. Please try to do so (otherwise it is much like reading about 'swimming' without jumping in the water!)

Please write to me here at any time if I can help with something. The only 'rule' on the Forum, besides "Just Sitting" Zazen each day, is to be kind to each other and mutually maintain “gentle speech” in all communication, even when voices disagree on hot issues. Perhaps more than anything, this allows a warm, welcoming atmosphere for new and old, where people can open up without fear.

THE FOLLOWING ARE SOME PLACES IN THE FORUM, LINKS AND POINTS MENTIONED IN THE 'GUIDED TOUR oF TREELEAF' VIDEO:

If you have a chance, please post a short introduction in the thread called 'Greetings by New Folks' (LINK). It will give others an opportunity to meet you.

WHAT IS THE BEST WAY TO FIND HELPFUL POSTINGS EACH DAY? The best place to go each day as your first stop is the area called "TAIGU and JUNDO RECOMMEND THESE THREADS TODAY" (LINK), where we list ongoing topics that we encourage folks to read.

You can also click the "New Posts" button in the upper left corner of the Forum screen to see all the topics which are active since your last visit.

Our "Treeleaf Forum" is divided (one forum, some divisions ... like all reality) into a forum for topics about"ZAZEN, ZEN, BUDDHISM & MORE ZAZEN!" (LINK). That is to discuss "matters of Practice" ... "How to" Zazen, Zen, Sutras, Buddhist Philosophy, Incense, Bell Ringing, Bows, Zafus, Robes and Roshis ... all of that Zen jazz. Oh, and of course, MORE ZAZEN! ...

Please post accordingly. If you are not sure what topic goes where ... it does not matter, as Zazen is all of life, all of life just Zazen!

We have a 'LIVE' NETCAST ZAZEN SITTING (90 minutes long ... not all that time sitting! ) each Friday/Saturday via a link posted in the Forum each week. On the first Saturday of each month, I also host a 'live' FOUR-HOUR RETREAT ... information here: (LINK)

Those sittings are recorded, and may also be sat ANY TIME after the netcast.

Many of our members like to sit together via "Google+" two-way video during our Zazen netcasts and at other times they arrange (you will find more information on this in the Forum) ... and our CALENDAR shows who is sitting today, so that you can join when you wish (LINK).

We hold an annual course, starting each Fall, of Precepts Study and 'Rakusu' sewing for our "JUKAI" (Undertaking the Precepts Ceremony) held each year in January. Information about that will be available in the late summer each year.

We are also developing our ENGAGED & CHARITABLE PROJECTS CENTER, a forum for the creative development of charitable and socially engaged projects and practices seeking to aid and assist our fellow sentient beings in this world. More information in the Forum.

And before I forget, a word on CONFIDENTIALITY AND PRIVACY: BECAUSE WE WISH OUR FORUM TO BE A PLACE WHERE PEOPLE CAN DISCUSS ANYTHING OPENLY, even very personal matters, we ask everyone to take SOME SIMPLE STEPS TO HELP SECURE PRIVACY while simultaneously allowing openness and frankness too. PLEASE QUICKLY REVIEW THE FOLLOWING 'TIPS' BEFORE YOU BEGIN POSTING IN OUR FORUM: (LINK)

The second part of my question is simply this. What should be the approach when you are sitting in Shikantaza and great insights come up? I understand how we should come back to just sitting and come again to the clear blue sky ten thousand times. But what about when something really useful for our own development comes up? Also what advice would you give for someone new to meditation and a great deal of repressed emotion is coming up? I have had some experience teaching Chi Kung, as well as doing acupuncture therapy where opening up like that can be very traumatic to some people.

I would let it go during the timeless time sitting. Return to sitting. After rising from the Zafu, perhaps you can look at such insights and see if they are really so great or not.

How to tell if they are great insights or just mental wheel spinning? Only time will tell. If it changes your life for the better, then I guess the insight is a keeper. If not, no. But our way is very much about letting things (and the past) go ... letting them go away or go on their way ... allowing, embracing, releasing and letting be. It is not so much about "figuring out".

Many things may come up in the quiet of Zazen ... sometimes strange stuff ... and we tend to let them go too. Sometimes, in the quiet, strange sensations or emotions may come up, and we tend to see much of it as just the mind playing its tricks.

Sometimes there are things to "figure out" in life ... from how to cook a pizza, to how to fix a broken computer, to why our life is sometimes so messy. So, we are not against "figuring out" and fixing and changing SO LONG AS, hand in hand, we simultaneously live the attitude of "nothing in need of fixing, changing, chasing after or figuring out".

Your reply and the links to the second question was what I needed!
Much appreciation!

I have tried in vain to get my Korean children interested in their own culture. My daughter just turning 21 is JUST beginning to get curious. The only Korean word she knows is Kabang, which means purse. We are having a nature versus nature experiment.

Jundo has pretty much summed it up here. From my personal experience, when on the Zafu just accept and let go (really a way of life off the Zafu as well). When you feel the knot of emotions loosening accept and let go. When you have an insight, accept and let go. I find the moment after Shikantaza when I stand up and look around me as if I'm seeing the world for the first time is when I can contemplate the insights and feelings that were experienced during Zazen.

One day, I experienced unity with all things while sitting. I didn't attribute the experience to that while sitting of course, only afterward when that experience gently allowed my perception to change. If you try to grasp onto these experiences during Zazen, they will evaporate because you've shrunk your awareness to focus just on them. Why does this happen? The conditions that gave them room to rise up (focusing on non-focus, thinking without thought, being without becoming) are no longer present when you fight the flowing. So, just go with it and marvel when Zazen is finished (keeping in mind that there is no end to Zazen)

Welcome Clark.
i have nothing to say beyond what Jundo said. but with time the feelings change just as you change.
so yet just sit with it. with time it will become a habbit and a real part of you. so there will not be this feeling of im sitting zazen. it will be just sitting zazen.
hope its not too moot.

Gassho, Dojin.

I gained nothing at all from supreme enlightenment, and for that very reason it is called supreme enlightenment
- the Buddha

Jundo nailed it. If I may add: The greatest insight of all is not to care about insights. Wether they come or not is not the point. As long as you ll play little games with finger and moon, and then, beyond moon-finger and finger-moon, just one big edgless moon. There is no sight of insight here.

Let me tell you a well kept yet open secret: every sentient being is already saved. Originally as is, nothing lacking, nothing extra. The fabric of this universe is a wonderful playground. Not for you to see, as this old fool wrote already, but to be.

As I write this by the river Kamo in Kyoto, tasting a macha frappucino, nothing else but this. Pain in my arm, nothing but this. Reading Shobogenzo and letting my gaze into the flowing waters, just this. Good or bad, just this. If I die, nothing but this.

Clark, the only thing I would like to add is that this is a very low stress place. Don't be shy to hang out at the zakenzai/teaparty/individual G+ sittings or to join in live for anything. No one here cares about lack of experience, crazy questions, bowing at the wrong time, forgetting a chant, or even kids/pets running across the room in the middle of zazen. I think Jundo would say, "It's all good practice"
(I'm only throwing this out there in case you feel supremely socially awkward as I often do)

It's awesome to practice on your own, but it's also awesome to practice and hangout with others on the path. You never know what you might learn or unlearn by accident!

Charles thank you. I am still learning how to work this all out from a technical as well as a philosophical issue I have been sitting Zazenkai since I joined, but not able to do the live time version. I may do the Tea Party on a Sunday to get warmed up.
Gassho
C

I just saw this thread and have really nothing to add other than to say that I felt much as you described when I first came here. And your question about what to do if a great insight comes up is a spot on match to what I was thinking back then. My advice? Just let it go...if it's important, it will come back to you.

If I can ever be of assistance in helping you navigate, just drop me a PM.

I am beginning to feel my way around here. I really would at some point like to join a LIVE sitting , but the times just don't seem to work with my many family obligations. I will just participate as I can and hopefully get to do one eventually.